Category Archives: Movie News

I want to get one thing out of the way right now. Yes, the character of Danny Rand is outdated considering he was created to capitalize on the Kung Fu craze when nearly every outlet was creating the white guy does everything craze. I am in full agreement that Marvel could have and really should have changed the Danny Rand character into a yuppie Asian New York kid but that’s not what happened. This is the Danny Rand we have and he’s just fine and whether the character should have been white or Asian is the least of this shows problems.

Each episodes opens like every one of these Marvel shows do, there is a really beautiful opening of a martial arts performing a kata while a Daft Punk cop theme song plays. As the song builds up to a disappointing ending it turns into a coincidental warning to the audience on what they’re in for. Yes, the show is boring, irritatingly so considering Marvel’s track record with their build up to The Defenders.

Episode one opens up with Danny Rand returning to New York and trying to gain access to the building of his father’s company where he runs into the office of his childhood friends Ward Meachum (Tom Pelphrey) and Joy Meachum (Jessica Stroup) who have been running the company since their father passed away years ago. They don’t believe this hobo who has walked into their office is the real Danny Rand and in a odd way to develop this story line we spend the next three episodes toying with the idea that this man, potentially, could or couldn’t be the real Danny Rand. Which leads to a lot of nothing going on for a crucial amount of episodes that are supposed to pull you in, introduce you to the characters and plant the seeds for the overall story.

The slow pace finally picks up during the sixth episode, directed by RZA, when Danny agrees to a tournament to the death to save a young woman’s life and this martial arts action show actually starts to pick up and become a martial arts show. The fighting choreography gets better as it appears that Finn is finally able to settle in the character and his complicated moves but those first five episodes are a slog to get through.

The main problem with Iron Fist isn’t just the acting, everyone does pretty well, even Finn Jones who plays the title character is completely fine once things get going but it’s so late in the game and he’s struggling with scripts that make Danny the smartest man in the room one moment then a complete idiot the next just because the story calls for it.

The overall story is missing in parts, lacks direction, and focus on who the characters are and what they’re all trying to accomplish. There isn’t a clear line on who the main villain is through the entire series until the final episode. Madame Gao (Wai Ching Ho) returns in a much beefier role but doesn’t add much except a few lines giving you more insight on her character. There is also a leader that controls a small faction of The Hand, and that too, while leading to an exciting fight, still doesn’t finish strong.

Iron Fist fills more like the board members for Marvel TV just handed the keys over to some producers and writers and told them to come up with something just so they could round out their Netflix shows and move on. It feels like Arrow-lite, cheaper then cheap. There is a part when Danny and Colleen have to go to China and it’s clear they’re filming off a New York pier.

The characters do dumb things just because they need them to, things a normal person wouldn’t do let alone a highly trained martial artist. When Danny needs a key piece of evidence to prove he is the actual Danny Rand, he manages to get jumped by a man because they need him to lose this evidence. For a character that’s supposed to be a living weapon, he fights off several attackers at one point, then gets handled they next by some henchmen. One of the characters begins to inquire why they couldn’t just use his fingerprints from when he was a kid to which he responds that he never had his fingerprints taken. I had my fingerprints taken in the 80’s and I’m supposed to believe that two billionaires never bothered to have their son’s fingerprints taken fifteen-plus years ago?

Despite this, Iron Fist isn’t completely horrible, it does get better, it’s just that it takes such a long time to get going which leads no where is a huge letdown compared to the other shows and the weaker of the four. There isn’t a memorable fight like the hallway scenes from Daredevil, there isn’t a memorable villain like Kilgrave or Kingpin, or takes full advantage of its roots like Luke Cage, or has a message like Jessica Jones, but there is one shining light and that is Jessica Henwick who plays Colleen Wing.

Strong female characters aren’t always done well, most of the time, when someone tries to make a strong female character they don’t bother to make her a believable fighter. Henwick is the strongest part about Iron Fist and a great addition to the Marvel Netflix shows. When she fights you believe she is as dangerous as she’s portrayed. She gets hurt, she bleeds, she’s vulnerable, but smart, tough, and sexy without being forced to wear some ridiculous costume that shows off her body and despite that she is the inevitable love interest, she doesn’t immediately fall for Danny.

I recommend Iron Fist if you’re curious in learning more about the last Defender, skip it if you couldn’t care less. There is nothing new here that you need to know that they won’t cover in The Defenders. This is the first, truly awful product Marvel has generated and I hope they learn their lesson leading into season 2 which, at this moment, I couldn’t care less about.

One type of movie I can never get enough of is shark movies. Ever since Jaws scared the crap out of me as a kid I have been completely hooked and have watched some pretty terrible films just to get my shark fix. From Shark Attack 3, Megalodon, to reading the Meg series by Steve Alten (which is finally getting the big budget movie treatment starring Jason Statham after 20 years of development hell and I’m super stoked for) I love movies that explore the ocean on what is out there and what can potentially be out there. This, however, does come with a cost because while Sharknado, Sharktopus, and Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus can be fun, they are really dumb movies.

So it’s refreshing to find a shark movie where the special effects look good, it’s filmed well, and is a legitimately scary thriller. In The Deep (or 47 Meters Down as it was originally called) is directed by Johannes Roberts and stars Mandy Moore (Lisa) and Claire Holt (Kate) as two sisters who are vacationing in Mexico when Claire decides they should go out on a shark observation tour. The wench holding the cage breaks and the two sisters plummet 47 meters down to the ocean floor where two 25-foot great white sharks are patiently waiting for them to try and escape.

What I like best about In The Deep is it cuts right to the chase, the girls are trapped with limited air and the two great whites are not messing around as they are constantly attempt to attack Lisa and Kate whenever they try to venture out the cage and figure out how to get back to the surface. Besides getting on a rusted and very questionable boat with people they don’t know, Lisa and Kate are pretty quick to adapt to their situation. They begin figuring out how to conserve air, only move when they really need to, stay on the ocean floor when they swim around unless they absolutely need to. They are tied to just sitting and waiting, they are very proactive and it’s nice to see two female character not take the horror movie trope route of just being dumb because the plot calls for it.

The film also looks fantastic above the water and below. The Mexico backdrop is amazing to look at and the underwater scenes are well lit so you can tell what’s going on but just dark enough to maintain suspense on where the sharks are and that they can attack at any given moment.

The one complaint I have, and it’s a minor one, is the ending. Some will like it, some won’t, while I appreciate the two different ways it could have ended and part of me wishes they had ended it just a minute or two earlier for a truly haunting type of ending. Despite that, In The Deep is highly recommend it if you can find it. It was sent for a DVD release which has been pulled and now there is word that it could be getting a theatrical release so I’d say paying a matinee price would be a good way to go. Sadly, any trailer that exist for this movie is horrible and kind of spoils the entire movie so I would avoid looking for any trailer until The Weinsteins (who bought the film) release an official one.

Alright, alright the moment of truth has arrived and after months, maybe years, of bad press, mean tweets, ugly internet rumors we the American public are finally getting to see this reboot of one of the greatest comedies of all-time: Ghostbusters. Well let’s start off with the good news; it’s not as bad as I thought it would be. What saves it you ask? Simple, it’s the very thing that so many have been complaining about for so long…the cast.

Yes that’s right sports fans, the cast of ladies, instead of men, are the only things that gave it some form of life. NOT because they are women but because they seem to be legitimately having a good time doing it, the chemistry of the actors is all there most of all goes to none other than Kate McKinnon. She’s the absolute dynamo that kept the show going and going strong. She plays it up as a cross between a punk-rock girl and a mad scientist, just smiling have more fun than anyone should be allowed to have. She won me over almost too easily, bravo! It’s welcome to see someone just not taking anything too seriously as she obviously is. And all actresses with comedy backgrounds just joshing and giggling just having a grand time. I mean let’s not forget that a male cast delivered just an ehhhh sequel, 1989’s Ghostbusters II.

But with all of that happening you might be asking yourselves, well Jason, sounds like you should like it more right? Hold on, here’s the bad news and it’s this, nothing in this movie is anything impressive and it’s all been done and done before. Have any of you seen the original 1984 classic? I mean it’s one of my all time favs! How many of us when we were kids dressed as a Ghostbuster for Halloween? Well, then folks you, I, we have all seen this one before. The plot couldn’t be anymore recycled than just straight up ripping off the same one by Dan Aykroyd and the late great Harold Ramis.

Basically it’s this three scientists who have been trying to prove for sometime the existence of ghosts, or the paranormal, one really quirky, one really smart, one just trying to get tenured. They find their proof and in turn they loose their jobs in academia and are forced to go into business themselves to investigate the paranormal and…..hey wait a minute! Isn’t that the plot of the original? Yes it is. But then they get just an average person not a scientist to help them and….HEY WAIT ANOTHER MINUTE!!! You’re catching on now.

The jokes that you saw in the original have the same set up, the same setting, the same punch line it’s all there as we’ve seen before. And then you have, enter stage left, a good looking, hunky guy who wears glasses (“who ordered the Clark Kent stripper-gram” one person mutters). And with that we get a lot of jokes from ladies who all just make lame joke after lame joke about that we have a good looking guy working for us…whoopee! That gets old fast. Then we have Melissa McCarthy and Kirsten Wiig doing the same old thing as they did in their last team up Bridesmaids same jokes, same quarks, same “oh hey look at me I’m a girl who keeps falling down” and “oh hey look at me I’m facing a mid-life crisis.” Oh just move on already.

Then you have the nemesis, which involves some guy who’s fed up with people and…well just wait you’ll find out. But all of it leads to a final act, which just goes overboard and over the top with c.g.i. that gives you a headache. It still goes back to the original complaint that it’s still the same as the 1984 classic. Same set up, different decade, different kind of effects.

Now I loved the original, it was a glorious example of campy and comedy, and it even when it tried never took itself seriously. It was a wonderful spoof on horror while bringing in a new style of comedy that benefited from having people behind it who knew exactly what funny is. Here all you have are just a bunch of recycled gags that have been done and done and done and done that don’t do much more than just make you say GET ON WITH IT!!!

But like I said it’s not a bad movie thanks to it’s cast but it’s also not a very good movie because of it’s writers and director Paul Feig who don’t even try to pay any homage to the original. They just get members and icons from the original movie to appear here and there to try and appease those of us, like myself, who grew up with it to say, see, see. And the cameos from famous people, and yes the original surviving cast, but they don’t even play their original characters they just appear, say hi and exit. But if there is a sequel, which without to say too much but the ending does set us up for one, as long as Kate McKinnon returns, gosh I just love her, there is always hope.

Directed by David Ayer, Suicide Squad, follows Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) in a post Superman world as a agent so deep within the U.S. government that she has the ability to pull together a team of DC villains (Deadshot, Harley Quinn, El Diablo, Killer Croc, & Captain Boomerang, just to name a few) by planting a exploding device in their heads and force them to be the black ops answer to all the potential meta-human threats now that the Man of Steel is currently taking a dirt nap. Waller is forced to activate the Suicide Squad to evacuate an important figurehead from a nearby city that is being overrun by a new magical force intent on destroying the world.

For the most part Suicide Squad looks to deliver on what DC promised in it’s rather brilliant marketing plan until you the film starts to unfold. Will Smith, who plays the can’t miss assassin Deadshot, is a return to his prior form of movie star, as he really takes a hold of this character and runs with it. While some people were complaining about the race of the character (Deadshot is actually white) I was more worried if Smith could actually pull off playing a man who murders people for money but he did more then pull his weight and I would be up to a Deadshot movie now.

Everything you thought about Margot Robbie is true, there are times she stumbles with the character, her accent goes in and out, but for the most part Robbie really owns the role of Harley Quinn and it will be interesting to watch her grow with the character in future movies as she was the real heart behind the film. As for the rest of the cast everyone showed up to work. Jay Hernandez is unrecognizable as El Diablo and is one of the cooler characters, Karen Fukuhara as Katana is a real bad ass, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agba makes Killer Croc into a really menacing creature, I believed that Joel Kinnman could really control and lead the worst of the worst as Rick Flag, even Jai Courtney was entertaining.

Cara Delevingne was pretty amazing as Dr. Moon/The Enchantress until they did something with her character and she started to remind me the fairy godmother from Cinderella and gave her best bippity boppity boo impression. The biggest disappointment comes in Jared Leto as The Joker. When the stills and screen shots were released I was confident that Leto would be able to supersede Heath Ledger but as of right now it’s safe to say Ledger is still the reigning champ.

I’m willing to cut some slack since he’s hardly in the movie, now that we know most of his scenes were cut out, but there were some glaring problems in this incarnation which I noticed by the way Leto would growl in every scene and it was clear he was having a hard time talking through the grill he had in his mouth the entire film. I would like to see just how crazy he can get in future installments, mainly in the Ben Affleck directed Batman flick which is coming down the pipeline especially since Batman is one of the best thing about this film and he has less screen time then Leto. The entire film reeks of too many hands trying to make the family dinner and it’s at this point WB/DC really needs to wake up.

It’s at this point you start to zero on the real problem of this film. What started out as a fun ride with some of DC’s classic villains takes a complete and very quick nose dive as it enters it’s final act because it has too much going on and feels very bloated in scope and I found myself wondering whey didn’t they scale it down and have this non-super powered villains go against a terrorist group. Batman is supposed to be out searching for the meta-humans so why not have them have to stop someone like Black Mask from trying to take over a section of Gotham, or maybe stop him from trying to take over Arkham Asylum which would have been a good place to have Leto’s Joker and create the right conflict for Harley.

After watching Man of Steel, Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice, and now Suicide Squad I’ve come to the conclusion, in order to salvage something from these films, is to look at them as a means to study and show exactly what not to do when making a comic book movie. Man of Steel is a lesson on not hiring a director that doesn’t get/like the character you’re making a movie about. BvS would be a perfect example in demonstrating the failures of not keeping your script simple and do not mash too much into your movie to the point that you end up cutting out important scenes that completely alter characters behavior and motivations, only to add them back in to have your film make sense. Finally, we have Suicide Squad, which is a perfect example of how editing can make or break your film.

If you’re dead set on watching this film no matter what like I was, then nothing is going to stop you, go to the theater, see it for yourself, but if you’re on the fence I would recommend to just wait and rent it. It’s not a complete waste of time but this is not film WB/DC needed right now.

It’s a strange time we live in where the history of a film franchise directly causes the decision making behind the conception of a sequel in the franchise. The original Star Wars trilogy, had it’s good and bad moments (something many people just seem to have forgotten about), each moving up and down the scale of quality and the prequels were mainly filler until we could get to the main finale that director George Lucas had always intended and show Anakin fully turning to the dark side of the Force and wiping out the Jedi, but overall they are pretty worthless.

The prequels countered so much of the lore of Star Wars that the film series entered a dark age as the adults who loved the films felt like we had to kiss them goodbye. It appeared that Star Was had slid into “it’s for children” territory forever and we lost the world and characters many of us fell in love with as kids.

The damage done with the creation of midichlorians, the conflicting details of Luke and Leia’s birth, the timeline between the fall of the Jedi and A New Hope isn’t enough time to make The Force an ‘ancient’ religion, and many others. The list goes on and on and it is because of these inconsistencies, the prequels, and George Lucas himself that The Force Awakens is a pretty much a carbon copy of A New Hope. Disney and director J.J. Abrams had the insanely difficult task to essentially reboot Star Wars, while not creating a full blown reboot, create a sequel with the old stars and yet introduce new ones, which would not only appeal to the kids, but bring back the adults who had felt betrayed by the prequels and those horrible cartoons. There was no way this was going to be easy.

The Force Awakens follows a droid, BB-8, who is carrying very important information about an old Jedi and finds itself on a desert planet where it is rescued by Rey (Daisey Ridley) who decides to help BB-8 on it’s quest. Finn (John Boyega) is a defected Storm Trooper who helps Rey and BB-8 try and escape The First Order spearheaded by Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), a member of The Knights of Ren and student of the dark side of the Force and that’s all you need to know, it’s a fun treat to explore this familiar and new world.

The strong foundation of the film is the chemistry between Finn and Rey as they are suddenly thrust into a war they wanted nothing to do with and come across hero’s of old in the form of Han Solo (Harrison Ford) Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher) and Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew). As for Luke…you’ll have to see it for yourself. Each set piece, which is actually filmed on locations and on sets and utilizes a great mixture of props and CGI. The lightsaber scenes are brutal, the flying scenes between the X-Wing and Imperial Fighters lead by the scene stealing Poe Dameron (Oscar Issac) are amazing. There is enough here for both the new and old fans.

While I understand the complaint that this is essentially a undercover remake of A New Hope, I must stress that history does repeat itself, as we’ve already seen not only in real life, but with the prequels and original trilogy and it’s no different here. Star Wars has always been a space opera and as I stated before that Abrams and company had to find a way to completely reinvent the Star Wars name without completely marching over anyone’s toes, they have really come through.

My only real complaint is there are a couple characters that are way under utilized and Kyo Ren, who starts out crazy dangerous, almost gets neutered as a villain early on but other then that the money is there, the love is there, the weight of the world is there, this is Star Wars, the true Star Wars that dumps you in a known environment and manages to take you on a new journey you can enjoy with characters you love, new one’s you want to love, and begin counting down the days until Episode 8 is released.

Every time Marvel announces a new project, save for the usual Avengers and it’s main roster of characters, I found myself wondering if this project will catch on or will this be that one project that actually fails. I questioned Captain America: The Winter Soldier because I wasn’t convinced Cap couldn’t work in today’s setting and I was proven wrong in a really big way as Winter Soldier is one of my favorite Marvel films. I questioned Guardians of the Galaxy because the characters were so obscure I had completely forgotten about them until the movie was announced however. Ant-Man only because I was never impressed with the character. I even questioned Daredevil, despite being so excited to check out the show I woke up at 3 a.m. to get started when it was released on Netflix.My point is, it’s getting kind of ridiculous to question Marvel when they consistently pump good to amazing material.

Jessica Jones, the second show in their four show line-up, which will consist of Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, and Iron Fist, completely pulls away from the action packed first season of Daredevil and falls more into into a more film noir, mystery genre, and later a flat out horror film. Jessica Jones (Krysten Ritter) is a hard drinking, cussing, private investigator in New York who is recovering from being physically and psychologically raped by Killgrave (David Tennet), who can control anyone around him by just speaking. Jessica is haunted by the events so badly that she has pulled away from society much save for the two relationships in the form of her childhood best friend Trish (Rachael Taylor), and Malchom (Eka Darville) a heroin junkie who lives down the hall. Jessica discovers that Killgrave is still alive when he has taken a young college girl and forced her to kill her parents and now Jessica must prove his abilities exist to prove the girl is innocent of the horrible crime.

The biggest strength behind Jessica Jones is it’s actually a story of a woman dealing with the aftermath of rape and torture in the guise of a super hero show. Show-runner Melissa Rosenberg really tackles the subject of a rape victim having to live her life after the attack Throughout the course of the season we slowly learn what Jessica went through while under the control of Killgrave, how it affected her, and why she’s so adamant on stopping him from having that control over anyone again. The show also avoids Jessica having to depend on Luke Cage (Mike Colter) a strong man who is literally unbreakable due to his rock hard skin. The two do team up through several episodes but never once does Jessica do something stupid and need him to bail her out. As deep of a hole she digs herself throughout the season she spends twice the effort digging her self out.

Despite all of this, the show has it’s problems. For one, and I had the same problem with Daredevil, you can tell that some of the shows were just padding to fill out the 13 episode order, with characters doing stupid things just to keep Jessica from killing Killgrave on the spot or getting him away from her just so she can chase him down for another 2-3 episodes. I also didn’t like the “Killgrave Support Group” subplot which consisted of a group of people who managed to survive their encounter with the psychopathic killer and would sit around and talk about what they felt and thought while being under Killgrave’s control. It just came across as silly and didn’t have the impact they were going for. The show also lags through many episodes as Jessica closes in and actually captures Killgrave, only to have him escape time and time again because the characters do something stupid then have him actually outsmart them.

Although I still enjoyed Daredevil more, mainly because I’m an action junkie, Jessica Jones is a very strong entry into the Marvel catalog and the series does have promise to moving forward since they decided to almost completely forgo an origin story and instead trickle hints of Jessica Jones creation throughout the first season with a promise to dive into her past in season 2. I highly recommend checking out Jessica Jones which is currently streaming on Netflix so you won’t be totally lost when she crosses paths with Daredevil, Luke Cage, and Iron Fist in the future but I also strongly stress the difference in genre’s between Jessica Jones and Daredevil for those of you expecting a flat out action series.

It appears that Alan Taylor will not be returning to the director chair for Thor’s third outing and realitive unknown Taika Waititi, who has only directed episodes for TV in Flight of the Conchords and What We Do in the Shadowsbeat out which was no doubt a long line of hopefuls. The filmmaker also wrote upcoming Disney animated movie Moana starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. The specifics on whether or not the movie will follow the story from the comics completely is unclear but it’s safe to assume we’ll be getting some more news before long.

I really hope Taika can bring something new to the Thor films. While I really enjoyed Thor and tolerated Thor: The Dark World I still have hope despite the Thor films being the weakest in the MCU. The problem is Captain America has the Russo Brothers, Guardians of the Galaxy has James Gunn, Ant-Man had Peyton Reed but Thor never had directors that seems completely behind on the Norse god. You could tell the Russo Brothers, James Gunn, and Peyton Reed really loved their characters and was doing the best for them. Thor hasn’t had someone who really loves the character just people doing a job.

The remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street, which was produced by Michael Bay’s production company Platinum Dunes is a very mixed bag. On one hand it looked really good sometimes beautiful and Jackie Earl Haley carried the mantel well as Freddy but on the other you could tell there wasn’t much interest in the product. Samual Bayer (Smells Like Teen Spirit Video) had very little interest in the product as he turned down the role multiple times from Michael Bay and Roony Mara looked like she was actually sleep walking the entire time. It’s tolerable enough that I can watch it every year for Halloween but nothing I would recommend to anyone to watch considering how the original movies hold up fairly well.

Robert Englund, the original Freddy Krueger, took a moment to talk about the older films, the remake, and the rumblings that New Line is actually looking into remaking A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors.

“There is gossip that apparently they approached Tuesday Knight the young actress from Elm Street 4 who replaced Patricia Arquette,” said Englund. “I tried to think, what does that mean? They can’t possibly be remaking A Nightmare On Elm Street Part 1 again? They just did that! It’s like remaking Godzilla twice in a row – they should have learned from lesson by now.

“I think they may be remaking A Nightmare On Elm Street Part 3,” Englund added, reiterating that this is all speculation. “Dream Warriors is the most successful and popular of the franchise. It would make sense for them in a kind of A Nightmare On Elm Street cinematic pun, to hire Tuesday to play the mother…because that would mean she’s playing her own mother.”

For those of you who are keeping hope alive that Englund may return as Freddy, he’s not only retired from the role, but it sounds as if the studio has zero intentions of even attempting to bring him back.

“They’re not gonna be bring me back for Freddy,” he explained. “Perhaps they’d bring me back in a cameo as an elderly dream expert at the local clinic for dream analysis or therapy?”Again, he clarifies this is all speculation: “I don’t really know any details at this time.”

It makes sense that New Line would be attempting to up the action on their horror franchise given how the Platinum Dunes version under-performed and as long as they pay tribute and actually do some cool things, I’m fine with them remaking one of the better sequels (although I like Dream Master better).

Robert also went on about why he feels the remake failed to capture the attention it had hoped to.

“I think the problem with the reboot was in timing,” exclaimed Englund. “I think they had just released the deluxe Blu-ray digitally remastered box set of all of my [Elm Street] movies – months before, within the year before the reboot – and an entire new younger generation saw those films on a 50″ flat screen in dad’s man cave during an adolescence sleepover.” He adds: “Those movies look great that way, and they hold up, especially Part 5, the double bill of Part 3 and 4, Wes Craven’s New Nightmare, and Freddy vs Jason, which is a comparably recent film. They had just seen those. It was just too soon [for the remake] and it suffered by comparison.”

“There’s also a rumor they re-shot the entire opening,” says Englund. “It does cast a pall over the film [as] everyone is already tainted by Freddy. There’s a black cloud over the kids already. I think you need to meet the kids, the fathers, meet the Elm Street brats before they’re under the shadow of, and haunted by Freddy.They needed the ‘before and after’ before Freddy begins the cat and mouse with them all. That ingredient was stepped on, that design was stepped on by their re-shoots, which set it deeper into the curse of Freddy before the movie began.”

I also feel that many fans weren’t ready to give up Robert Englund as their Freddy. There is a entire segment in the documentary about the Elm Street films called Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy(which I highly recommend you watch asap!) where they producers and director for A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge admit that they the guy they had hired to replace Robert just wasn’t cutting it and they ended up replacing him with Englund who finished out the rest of the film. The man really brought the character to life, and while I enjoyed Haley’s version, he has some massive shoes to fill and he didn’t quite do it. Guess we’ll have to wait and see what comes out of these rumors but I’m not ready to live without anymore Freddy.

A film that instantly jumped up my list as one of the best action films is John Wick. Starring Keanu Reeves as the title character John Wick follows an ex-mob enforcer who goes after a mob boss and his son when the son murders his dog and steals his car, the catch, the dog was a gift given to him by his dying wife to help him cope with her death.

“With such tremendous fan and critical support for John Wick, we knew that there was still so much more of this story to tell,” said a Lionsgate spokesman. “We are thrilled that Keanu, David and Chad have re-teamed with us and promise to bring audiences even more excitement the second time around.”

The film ended up taking $78 million at the global box office, representing a serious return on its $20 million budget. Reeves will be back for the sequel, as will co-directors David Leitch and Chad Stahelski, alongside screenwriter Derek Kolstad.

No release date has been confirmed as yet, with John Wick 2 expected to arrive in cinemas in 2016.

Based off the book series by Steve Alten, Meg has been sitting in development hell since the late 90’s. The books follow Jonas Taylor, an ex-Navy diver who discovers the ancestor of the great white shark, the Megalodon, who was thought to be extinct for thousands if not millions of years, is still alive and thriving in the ocean. Many directors tried to get the movie going including Jan De Bont and it should be no surprise that this movie is on Guillermo del Toro’s list of failed movie projects.

Thanks to the overwhelming success of Jurassic World, the film was fast tracked into production and horror director Eli Roth was hired to bring the dinosaur shark to life. Eli talked about finishing the script and his decision to make the shark CG instead of using practical effects.

“We just turned in the script to the studio and I’m designing the artwork now. I’m doing some character and creature designs. It’s so much fun. I cannot wait. The thing is with Meg, the size of the creature, it sort of becomes impractical to do it practically, but I’ve seen how they’ve done the whale in In the Heart of the Sea. They showed me footage and they’re like, ‘Before you judge CG, take a look at this,’ and I was like, ‘Oh my god.’ The whale in In the Heart of the Sea looks so good. I was like, ‘All right, we’re good.’ I wouldn’t do the movie unless I believed the technology was there to do it and the great thing is with Warner Bros and the team that we’re doing [it] with, we’re gonna have the resources to do it right.”

The size of the shark does help lean the decision to utilize CGI more then practical effects because the shark is supposed to be the T-Rex of the ocean, in fact, in the beginning of the book a megalodon eats a T-Rex that has traveled too far off the coast.

I have been waiting for this movie for years. I’ve read the first four books and they read like summer blockbuster movies, they are fun, violent, scary, and if WB actually puts the work in we could have another Jurassic World/Jaws on our hands.